okay is a relative term
by Inflorescences
Summary: harry tries to convince himself that everything is fine. it's really not. but maybe someday it will be.
1. it's (not) okay

He rips out weeds in the hot summer sun and tries to ignore his wild thoughts.

It's not right.

Harry tosses out another weed and moves over, knees aching like an old man's. He snorts a little, under his breath. At twelve, he was the opposite of an old man.

He sure felt like it sometimes though.

Checking his more-often-than-not-but-for-once-unbroken watch, he curses under his breath. He had to remember to thank Fred for that word later, but for now he had to move faster or he wouldn't get dinner.

That's been happening more again.

When Harry was little, before Hogwarts, he would go days without a meal sometimes. Withholding of food and the cupboard were the Dursleys' go-to method for punishing Harry- that, or setting Dudley's gang on him. Vernon and Petunia didn't like to touch him very much.

Besides, Harry was getting better at avoiding Vernon's particular shade of purple that overrode that distaste for touching the freak.

(Petunia usually just throws something at him when she's frustrated).

So what if they insulted him sometimes (all the time)?

So what if they didn't give a damn about him?

So what?

That little voice echoes in the back of his head again -it's not alright- and Harry shoves it farther away.

It's fine.

Other people have it worse.

It's fine.

It's fine.

It's fine.

 _(Maybe if he repeats it enough it'll be true)_


	2. summer seeds

Harry isn't exactly certain how old he was when he realized that maybe things weren't normal at the Dursley household.

Well, he had always noticed the difference between he and Dudley- it wasn't exactly difficult to miss. Harry had grown up jealous and desperate for the love that Aunt Petunia so willingly showered onto his cousin and withheld so jealously from he, Harry. He had always known that Dudley could get away with anything when it came to Harry- whether hitting him or stealing one of his only (broken) toys or taking his food. He had long since stopped searching for a nod of approval from his uncle or a smile from his aunt.

But maybe Harry thought that was normal. His aunt and uncle and cousin all called him Freak after all. And no one in the neighborhood looked like him at all- he saw them in the streets sometimes. All light skin, like the bread in his aunt's pantry. Harry was dark haired and dark skinned with bright green eyes- Dudley was pale and pudgy and red, blond and blue eyed just like his father. Surely a Freak like Harry was supposed to be treated different, just like Uncle Vernon said.

But Harry went to school and he saw other kids with dark skin and saw loving parents and kind siblings and thought that maybe it wasn't his skin that made him a Freak.

There was something wrong with Harry. There had to be. Why else would he be treated so badly? Normal children didn't get shoved into cupboards. Normal children didn't go to bed hungry while still being able to smell bacon and steak in the kitchen at night.

And the teachers never did anything about Dudley bullying Harry, so surely Harry was doing something to cause it. He had to be.

Through his years of primary, Harry searched for the answer- what was he doing wrong? Why was he so hated?

He learned that normal kids don't cook meals at six years old.

He learned that normal kids didn't have to purposely fail to make someone else look better.

He learned that normal kids didn't come to school with bruises hidden under shirt collars.

And he blamed it on himself.

But maybe Harry was just barely thirteen and about to start his third year at Hogwarts when he realized that maybe it wasn't his fault. That maybe the Dursleys were the abnormal ones.

It was a terrifying thought. But surrounded by the Weasleys at all times, it seemed to plant some summer seeds in him. To be absolutely saturated in the love that swamped the Burrow-

It was so different from Privet Drive.

The first time Molly Weasley ruffled his hair, Harry froze. He had no idea what had just happened until, slowly, he reached up a hand to pat down the mess. It was an undeniable gesture of affection and such a universe away from what had ever occurred at the Dursleys that Harry was left floored.

And the seed began to grow.

When Arthur Weasley glanced at him that first morning and seemed confused for a sheer second, and then just accepted Harry's presence- he couldn't describe the feeling blossoming in his chest, but he knew that Uncle Vernon would never be so accepting of his presence.

For the first time he could remember, Harry felt completely and utterly welcomed.

And the seed grew some more.

As the Weasleys and Harry packed up to leave for the year, Harry took one of Uncle Vernon's old, smelly socks and shoved it deep into Ron's trashcan. It was a small act of rebellion.

It was a seed beginning to bloom.


End file.
